This topic has become near and dear to me recently.
Taken at its normal meaning, working while “under the weather” means you’re in some way sick, and probably should be at home resting instead of working. In today’s work culture, that means that you’re sitting in your cubicle or office with half a dozen OTC drugs close at hand and looking paler than the ghost rumored to haunt your office building. If you’re lucky, it means you’re telecommuting from your couch with medicine in one hand and chicken soup in the other.
What it means more than anything else, though, is that you aren’t working to your fullest potential, because you simply can’t. Your body wants to shut down to heal and become better.
I’ve been wrestling with allergies and an interrupting head cold since mid-October. (I become immune to anti-histamines really quickly) Because I’m used to having allergies, I’ve just been working through them as I always do, but this year I’m noticing a severe drop in my motivation and productivity. I’m making silly mistakes I normally wouldn’t make. I’m not getting things done. And I’ve finally figured out why this year is different. This year, I have a headache from my allergies that is slowly getting worse.
My head is in severe pain, and is exerting its power to stop the rest of me from functioning. This is why it’s always nice to give yourself a break from work when you’re sick.
Another way of looking at being under the weather has become very near and dear to my heart over the past few days. Seattle has been rained on. Granted, this is normal for Seattle, but over the weekend, it rained hard and continuously. Some areas south and east of my neighborhood are so badly flooded that they’ve been evacuated. One of my coworkers has to go nearly an hour out of her way to get to work. My own possible paths to work have become very treacherous. In fact, at one point on Monday, the nearby highway was more lake than road, making getting home a very dangerous proposition.
Again, as with the health problems, you can hope to sit and wait it out at work, not being productive because you’re worried about how the weather is affecting you and those you love. You can work from home if your work allows for that. You can just call in and tell them that you cannot get safely to work (I’ve worked for places where that was considered a poor excuse, even while a hurricane or blizzard, or their remnants, raged outside.)
Weather can have a harmful effect on your productivity. You can’t control it, so you ought to consider what your back-up plans are going to be.
